read it in a flick — self-hosted speed reading for PDFs, EPUBs and your read-later pile.
myflick.app · self-host · architecture · the research · contracts
Hosted, nothing to install: myflick.app — read in one tap, no account.
One command, one container, one SQLite file. No Redis, no Postgres, no external services.
curl -fsSL https://myflick.app/install.sh | sh→ http://localhost:8484. Your library lives in a named volume; re-run to upgrade in place.
Read the script first: install.sh. Or clone and docker compose up -d. Add --with-admin for the operator panel on :8485. SMTP, SSO, reverse proxy and Podman/Quadlet in docs/SELF-HOSTING.md.
One word at a time, each anchored on the red pivot letter your eye locks onto — RSVP reading with Optimal-Recognition-Point alignment. It paces rather than flashes: rare words linger, common ones fly, long words split, sentences breathe.
- Guest-first — read in one tap; sign up later and your library follows you.
- Your whole library — paste, PDF, EPUB,
.txt, Markdown, Kindle clippings, a URL. - A habit — streaks, a daily goal, real stats, a year-in-review.
- Yours — AGPL-3.0, self-hostable in one command, pseudonymised IPs, export and delete built in.
The honest part: RSVP removes eye movement, not attention. Most readers settle around 400–500 wpm; comprehension degrades as the rate climbs, and dense text still wants a second pass — which flick is built for. What the research actually says →
Contracts-first: docs/CONTRACTS.md is the one binding document — timeline format, HTTP API, config, design tokens. Every part speaks it and nothing else.
flowchart TD
subgraph clients["clients — each speaks CONTRACTS.md"]
web["<b>flick-web</b><br/>Svelte 5 · the reference client"]
ext["browser extension<br/><i>· later</i>"]
admin["<b>flick-admin</b><br/>operators"]
end
landing["native landing view<br/>myflick.app"]
web -- "HTTP/JSON · /api" --> server
ext -. "HTTP/JSON · /api" .-> server
admin -- "/api/admin · bearer" --> server
landing -- "CTA →" --> web
subgraph backend["flick-backend — Rust"]
server["<b>flick-server</b><br/>axum · sessions · SQLite"]
core["<b>flick-core</b><br/>the reading engine"]
db[("SQLite · WAL")]
server --> core
server --> db
end
flick-core is pure and deterministic — text in, paced timeline out: ORP pivot fixed in place, Zipf-frequency weighting, long-word chunking, wrap-up pauses. Clients never reimplement it; they play timelines on a frame-accurate rAF scheduler, so changing WPM never needs a round trip.
Your position is server-side from the first visit — a guest session mints immediately, merges into your account when you sign up, and checkpoints every ~5 s. It's all one SQLite file with FK cascades, so deleting your account really deletes your data.
What's free stays free. Self-host is everything, forever; hosted adds Pro to fund the project — never the other way around.
Small, single-purpose, one contract. Every repo tests on every push; tagging vX.Y.Z gates the release, and the nightly versions workflow fails loudly if a manifest and its release drift apart.
| Repo | What it is | Release |
|---|---|---|
| flick (this one) | Umbrella: docs, contract, installer, Compose, legal |  |
| flick-backend | Rust — engine (flick-core) + API server (flick-server) |
 |
| flick-web | Svelte 5 web client — the reference implementation, marketing landing included as a native i18n'd view |  |
| flick-admin | Operator panel — analytics, users, events, announcements (the corepanel toolkit lives in-tree since 1.1) |  |
Pseudonymised IPs, no ad tech, one-click export (GDPR Art. 15/20) and deletion (Art. 17) — PRIVACY · TERMS. The hosted service is an AGPL §13 network service, so its complete source is these repos: run a modified flick as a service and you owe your users the same.
AGPL-3.0-only (the marketing site is MIT; bundled-data attribution in NOTICE). House style is strict and load-bearing — monospace, square corners, one accent, no gradients, glows or shadows. Read CONTRIBUTING.md and CONTRACTS.md, and open an issue before a feature PR.